Coindesk Scam – Received Fake Coindesk Messages via Text?

If you’ve received a text such as the above to your phone, or perhaps the likes of email etc – it generally means you have been the target of a scam.

“CoinDesk” is the largest and one of the most respected news portals for “Bitcoin” and other “crypto” currency – a trusted source for millions who are actively involved in the trade of “Bitcoin”, “Ethereum” etc.

Unfortunately, due to the rapid rise of the price of “Bitcoin”, fraudsters have begun trying to trick people into handing over credit card / bank information in order to steal their money.

The scam is actually very simple – the way you “make money” from a “cryptocurrency” is to either buy or sell it from/to other people. Because the “currency” has no inherent value in itself, it relies on trade into to retain its price. This is where the scam sits…

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The way the “scam” works is to get you to click a link where you’ll be prompted to either initiate a payment on your credit card or provide your banking information.

The reason why you may wish to do this will be cited as the “bitcoin” being locked in an “exchange” where you’ll need to pay a “small fee” to unlock it. The fee will go directly to the fraudsters and you’ll basically be left without any “bitcoin” and down about $100 (or even more).

The way the scam has grown is down to the way in which the “price” of a Bitcoin has risen sharply in the past few weeks. Now trading at over $10,000 per “coin”, many people are beginning to “wake up” to the idea that they too could “make money” by trading them.

In other words, “what a steal” it would be if you “only” have to use $100, $120 or $150 to “unlock” a “coin” worth £5,000+! If you’re not familiar with the murky world of “crypto” currencies, you’d be forgiven for thinking you’d won the lottery.

Little do most people know that “bitcoin” as an underlying store of value is almost entirely worthless. It’s mainly a “cheque” for the 21st century – a “decentralized” way to instruct payments from different banking institutions. Each time you “trade” a bitcoin, you still have to “buy” it with “real” money… which is partly where there is such a misunderstanding about it.

The big problem is that because the market is NOT regulated, and there are very few companies that can be trusted in the space, frauds (such as the one you’re experiencing with the “Coindesk” scam) are becoming an ever common occurance.

Thus, if you receive a message such as the one listed above, the best thing to do is close it and get on with your life. Bitcoin, Ethereum etc are primarily a speculative bubble, with the majority of the coins holding ZERO value. Furthermore, because their “trade” is almost entirely unregulated, anyone can say anything and it will be incumbent on the buyer to make the judgement as to whether it’s a legitimate way to use their money.

As with ALL things in the financial world… if it’s too good to be true, it probably is.

Bitcoin’s price will drop very soon, as will the majority of other “crypto” currencies. It has “bubble” written all over it — the only people making money are the ones who bought when the “coins” were $200… to them, “selling” at $10,000 is a HUGE profit.

What you have to appreciate is that the reason why the price of the “coins” has risen so sharply is because the majority of “main steam” people are now trying to get in on the action. Truck drivers are emptying their savings accounts in order to “buy” a new “coin” and it’s this injection of “liquid” capital that’s giving the early adopters their payout.

You might argue it’s similar to a Ponzi or Pyramid scheme.

As such, the moral of the story is that you should not trust ANYBODY with your money, especially when it comes to massively unregulated markets like “crypto” currency.